ADV1582BE Solve your Citrix Problems with VMware Technologies Nick Jeffries, Senior Solutions Architect, VMware Sebastian Brand, Lead Systems Engineer, VMware #VMworld #ADV1582BE
Disclaimer This presentation may contain product features that are currently under development. This overview of new technology represents no commitment from VMware to deliver these features in any generally available product. Features are subject to change, and must not be included in contracts, purchase orders, or sales agreements of any kind. Technical feasibility and market demand will affect final delivery. Pricing and packaging for any new technologies or features discussed or presented have not been determined. 2
Agenda 1 Citrix XenApp to Horizon: Four Simple Options to Move Forward 2 Citrix XenDesktop: Migrate to the Next Generation of Virtual Desktops 3 XenApp / XenDesktop and Horizon Component Comparison 4 Migration Assessments: Look Before You Leap! 5 Migration Best Practices and Things to Consider 6 Tools to Help Simplify the Migration 7 Questions and Answers 3
VMware Horizon 6 introduced support for published applications and desktop sessions with RDSH. (Microsoft Remote Desktop Session Host services) Customers Need to Consider Making a Move Now Microsoft Windows Server 2003 support ended on July 14, 2015 XenApp 5.x End of Life XenApp 4.5 End of Extended Support Citrix XenDesktop 5.x End of Life VMworld 2017 Content: Not for If customers are not on Citrix XenApp or XenDesktop 7.14 they are facing a difficult upgrade. Now is the time to consider a better option. publication 4
Horizon RDSH: RDS Hosted Apps Innovation Hosted Apps and RDS Desktops USB Storage Devices User Environment Management Smart Card Skype for Business / Lync 2013 for RDS Desktops HTML5 and Chromebook Clients Client Drive Redirection URL Content Redirection Application Layering File Type Association Printing RDSH Image Management Windows Media Redirection Scanning and Imaging Devices Load Balancing USB Redirection 3D Apps and Desktops with NVIDIA GRID Autodesk AutoCad 2016 and Revit 2016 supported and certified with VMware Horizon RTAV 5
Citrix XenApp and Horizon: Four Options to Move Forward Integrate XenApp with Horizon One Web portal for Horizon virtual desktops, SaaS applications, and XenApps Replace Citrix Web Interface or StoreFront with VMware Identity Manager Web portal Maintain existing XenApp RDS Hosts and Citrix Receiver client Migrate XenApp to Horizon Convert healthy XenApp RDS Hosts with installed applications to Horizon Replace XenApp Web Interface or StoreFront with VMware Identity Manager web portal Replace Citrix Receiver with Horizon Client Replace XenApp with Horizon Implement new Horizon RDS Hosts with installed applications Replace XenApp Web Interface or StoreFront with VMware Identity Manager Web portal Replace Citrix Receiver with Horizon Client Enhance XenApp with Horizon and vsphere App Volumes: Real-time application delivery with lifecycle management User Environment Manager (UEM) ThinApp application virtualization Horizon virtual Desktops Virtual SAN, NSX vsphere 6
XenDesktop: Migrate to the Next Generation of Virtual Desktops Migrate XenDesktop to VMware Horizon App Volumes: Real-time, personalized application delivery User Environment Manager Replace Citrix Delivery Controllers with Horizon Decommission PVS / MCS Migrate Web Interface and StoreFront to VMware Identity Manager Dedicated desktops Disposable Persistent desktops Generic Numerous desktop images Single Personalize generic desktops in real time Migrate applications to App Volumes Migrate user profile and app settings to UEM PVS, MCS, Composer Optional! Useful for storage optimization only Desktops deleted and redeployed on logout Deploy updates by replacing image NO RECOMPOSE Enhance XenDesktop with Horizon and vsphere App Volumes: Real-time, personalized application delivery User Environment Manager ThinApp application virtualization VSAN, and NSX PVS / MCS: optional or replace with Instant Clones vsphere 7
Enhance Citrix with App Volumes, UEM & ThinApp App Volumes Real time application delivery to Citrix virtual desktops and XenApp Servers Enables next generation generic & disposable virtual desktops Single image management for XenApp and XenDesktop Writable Volumes: support User Installed Apps (XenDesktop only) User Environment Manager Enables next generation generic & disposable virtual desktops Dynamic, context-based profile management and application configuration Personalized application settings follow user ThinApp Application isolation eliminates conflicts between applications Reduces XenApp Server sprawl ThinApps can be deployed by App Volumes or natively streamed from file share 8
VMware NSX for Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop NSX is an excellent solution for Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop Advanced virtual networking Micro-segmentation Enables secure, multi-tenant deployment of XenApp with Citrix Netscaler Endorsed by Citrix in recent blog: https://www.citrix.com/blogs/2017/01/05/xendesktop-and-xenapp-interoperability-with-vmware-nsx 9
Components Comparison VMware Horizon, Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop
Citrix and VMware Components Comparison 11
Citrix and VMware Components Comparison 12
Citrix and VMware Components Comparison 13
Citrix and VMware Components Comparison 14
Migration Assessment: Look Before You Leap! 15
Major Assessment Topics Business requirements XenApp / XenDesktop infrastructure Microsoft RDSH / Terminal Services Published applications and desktop sessions Virtual desktops and applications (XenDesktop) Users and user requirements Client devices Supporting systems 16
Best Practices and Things to Consider Citrix Migration
Best Practices and Things to Consider Choosing the best migration approach Is the simple way always the better way? Gradual vs. one-time migrations Garbage out, Garbage in Moving problems from Citrix into Horizon Scalability and testing Conduct pilot (live) Consider simulated scalability testing 18
Best Practices and Things to Consider: XenApp Migration Use Identity Manager Web portal to facilitate the migration Provides front end to make XenApp migrations seamless to users First integrate Identity Manager with XenApp then Migrate to Horizon Common to have multiple XenApp environments Typically aggregated with StoreFront, Web Interface, and/or NetScaler Identity Manager supports multiple farms Should XenApp farms match Horizon RDS farms? Application silos and load-managed server groups Putting all the apps on every server is this the right thing to do? Consolidate multiple XenApp versions on fewer Horizon RDS farms 19
Best Practices and Things to Consider: XenApp Migration Citrix NetScaler NetScaler now supports load balancing Horizon using PCoIP! Support for Blast Extreme coming soon (per Citrix) Don t forget Horizon maximums Large environments using desktops and applications may exceed pod limits Optimize the RDSH servers - Makes a difference implement RDS optimization best practices - VMware Windows OS Optimization Tool 20
Best Practices and Things to Consider: App Volumes for RDS VMware App Volumes for XenApp and Horizon Hosted Applications Install App Volumes agent on each RDSH server / server image Assign App Stacks to computers (not users) No support for writable volumes or user-installed apps Use VHD in-guest mounting for non-vsphere-based RDSH servers VMworld 2017 Alternate hypervisors or physical servers Use App Volumes to deploy ThinApps if application isolation is needed Content: Not for publication 21
Best Practices and Things to Consider: App Volumes for VDI VMware App Volumes for XenDesktop and View in Horizon Install App Volumes agent in each virtual desktop and desktop image / template Assign AppStacks to users (not computers) Writable volume support for user-installed apps Use VHD in-guest mounting for non-vsphere-based hypervisors Use App Volumes to deploy ThinApps if application isolation is needed 22
Best Practices and Things to Consider: VMware Identity Manager VMware Identity Manager (formerly Workspace Portal) Supports XenApp 5.x, 6.x, and 7.x and XenDesktop 7.x The Integration Broker syncs applications and user entitlements Supports single sign-on (SSO) Integration Broker supports Windows Server 2008 R2 and 2012 / 2012 R2 Integration broker requires IIS 7.0 (2008 R2) or IIS 8.0 (2012) (NOT for Web portal) SSL certificates needed on all components (Identity Manager, IB, and Citrix Farm) XenApp servers and XenDesktop Delivery Controller require Citrix PowerShell Remoting Deploy separate Integration Brokers for sync and SSO for large farms IDENTITY MANAGER DOES NOT PROXY OR TUNNEL CITRIX CONNECTIVITY Fully supports Citrix NetScaler for Tunneling or ICA/HDX Proxy 23
Best Practices and Things to Consider: vsphere for Remote Desktop Services VMware vsphere for RDSH servers No memory or CPU oversubscription (consider memory reservations) 1 vcpu to each physical core and enable hyper-threading (Intel) Disable BIOS-level CPU power saving vcpus: Less is more Four (4) vcpu is typically the sweet spot Do NOT exceed cores per physical CPU per RDSH server Scale out with more servers Disable DRS for RDSH servers and Horizon Connection/Security Servers Review and analyze memory demands for each application Dedicate ESXi hosts for RDSH Host Connection Servers and other support infrastructure in Management Block and virtual desktops in separate Desktop Block 24
Best Practices and Things to Consider: Storage and Network Storage for Virtualized RDSH servers Not as IO-intensive as virtual desktops HOWEVER: Still plan for login storms and optimal performance Conduct assessment to determine IOPS footprint and validate with pilot Network infrastructure Multiple application and desktop sessions from client requires more bandwidth than a single connection to a virtual desktop Be sure to assess network performance, especially the WAN Tune and optimize Blast Extreme and PCoIP Optimize the virtual desktops and RDSH servers 25
Best Practices and Things to Consider: End-to-End Monitoring vrealize Operations for Horizon and Published Apps One console for monitoring applications, desktop and infrastructure resources Supports Horizon, Citrix XenApp and XenDesktop Identify which applications and processes are consuming most resources, causing increased latency and poor end-user experience Assessment, health analysis and remediation recommendations on systems performance and health VMworld 2017 Content: Not for publication Visibility into end-user sessions leads to faster problem resolution for helpdesk and better overall end user experience 26
Tools to Help Simplify the Migration
VMware Horizon Migration Tool 28
Horizon Migration Tool Features Horizon Migration Tool, which migrates published applications and virtual desktops from XenApp & XenDesktop to Horizon 7 or Horizon Cloud, has the following features: For XenDesktop migrations: Environment checking Pool creation Pool migration Entitlement migration Migration status tracking Configuration validation VMworld 2017 For XenApp migrations: Environment checking Farm and Pool creation App pools & desktop pools migration Content: Not for publication Entitlement migration Horizon agent readiness checking of RDSHs App availability checking on RDSHs Compatibility checking 29
Horizon Migration Tool Supportability Supported XenApp & XenDesktop versions: XenApp & XenDesktop 7.6 and later (FMA) XenApp 5.0, 6.0, and 6.5 (IMA) Supported XenApp types: Server desktop Application (server installed) Supported XenDesktop types Manual Pool Automated Pool (only MCS random pool) VMworld 2017 Supported Horizon versions: Horizon 7.0 and later Horizon Cloud (16.11.0 and 17.1.0 releases) XenDesktop 7.6 and later migrations only Content: Not for publication Get it here: https://labs.vmware.com/flings/horizon_migration_tool 30
VMware Operating System Optimization Tool Automates optimizing virtual desktops and Microsoft RDSH servers for VDI Based on Microsoft and VMware operating system best practices Tunes Windows and disables unnecessary services and features Templates for Windows 7 10 and Windows Server 2008 R2 and 2012 / 2012 R2 Templates can be customized Supports local and remote systems Get it here: https://labs.vmware.com/flings/vmware-os-optimization-tool 31
Solve your Citrix problems with VMware Technologies today! Driving Factors Windows 2003 End of Life XA and XD End of Support Citrix and XenApp Fatigue Integrate Migrate Replace Complete Solutions for both XenApp and XenDesktop Integrate / Enhance XenApp Migrate / Replace XenApp Migrate / Enhance XenDesktop VMworld 2017 Content: Not for GO Professional Services Migration Assessments Plan and Design Services Infrastructure Upgrades Implementation Services Tools to Help Assessment Tools publication Migration Tool Optimization Tool 32
Questions and Answers